A freethinking man of the ocean, Tyler Warren possesses a rare approach to wave sliding; unparalleled, distinct. His surfing is subtle, yet simultaneously loud. Tyler let us into his life for half a day. Watch him surf, shape an asymmetrical board, and cruise in his art studio. Thank you Tyler for sharing. Thank you Brooks at We Love Creativity for setting up the interview. Music / The Growlers - Sea Lion Goth Blues Film / Edit - James Tull Interview / Brooks Sterling Canon 7d / 16-35 2.8 / 50 1.8 / 100-300 Final Cut Pro / After Effects http://www.jamestull.com http://www.welovecreativity.com WeLoveCreativity.com - How did you originally get involved with art and design? Tyler - Just like every little kid, likes to color and draw. I just always enjoyed creating my own little world, drawing indians, or insides of tanks. Whatever my imagination wanted to see. I just never stopped, since I was young. Your family is involved in art too right? My mom always encouraged me to do art. She was very inspirational. My whole mom's side of the family is artistic. My dad too, he would always draw plans before he builds something. LIke a table, or patio cover. My uncle is an oil painter. I work for him for a couple years and learned a lot. It was like art school. I always took art classes in school. I think its definitely inside me, just creating. What influences or inspires you art? A little bit of everything. Every day life. I really want to let what's around me inspire me. Whether it be someone I know's vehicle, or a certain feeling of a time of day at my local beach. I'm starting to tap more into who I am, and where I'm from and what I do. But then I have all these influences of books I've boughten over the years on amazon, or stuff like that. You can see old illustrator work.. I like anything from the 1900s to 1960's 70-90's all that stuff too. There is so much out there that can inspire you. Take us through the steps of your creations. To start a project or an idea. I usually will sketch it out at my desk in the morning while drinking coffee, or sometimes in my car at the beach. Things start with a small idea. If its a good one, it will keep re occurring in your mind, and you'll want to do it. After I do a loose sketch or idea, I will really hone in on what I'm drawing, and find imagery of it, or similar objects. Say I want to do Terry Martin's van, that he ended up totaling, and now he has another one. But he had this one van he drove for 30 years, it's all rusty and beat. My idea was to put it infront of a glass shop. So I shot a photo of the van, before he totaled it. I worked from that, get all the lines going, a roach sketch and tighten it up. If it's an oil painting, I'm usually working on canvas. I'll put a transparent tinted jesso over it, 3 times, then sand it so its super smooth. The way I learned to paint, is just really thin. Blend your color, and slowly build it like a coloring book. Then you can go back over it, and do glazes and push and pull darks, bumping up the contrast, like on your computer. Pattern work. My first commission job was for simple shoes. Now I really want to do oil painting and bigger stuff. I want to get into designing clothing more, like the actual article of clothing, and picking good colors. Basically designing an article of clothing that I want to wear. Like a bitchen pair of good denim jeans and plain t-shirt, nice colors. That is the next step, but have an art element to it. How did you get involved in shaping surfboard? I always loved surfboard design and the idea of designing a surfboard that you're going to ride all the time. Certain boards would appeal to me more than others, because of the template, the curve, or the fins or the color. My dad used to do photocopies of board templates for me. I drew one and he would bring them back, and I would fill them in with color. I shaped my first board when I was 14 with my friend Christian Wok, and his little brother Carson. We ripped the glass off this old 70's board and made a little single fin egg. We shaped it on the side of the street at the base of his driveway. The thing actually ended up coming out really good. Then I think I made a board for Alex Knost after that, when I was 15 or 16. We shaped one together, in front of his house. That one came out a little more wobbly (laughs). Then I made about a board a year, for 10 years. But in those ten years, I watched almost all my boards get shaped. I've watched a dozen different shapers shape. Like Terry Martin, Malcolm Campbell, Garry Larson, Marc Johnson, Manuel Caro, Josh Hall, Chris Christensen. All these people that influence me, just so you can see what they're doing. Because I liked watching my boards get shaped. And then I was teaching this little girl to surf. She was 9, and I was letting ride this white pony board, one of Richard Kedman's hydro dynamica projects. It was like 4'11by 22 inches wide with a swallow tail. It was an epoxy, and sh